


if i could, i would feel nothing

by soulofme



Category: Original Work
Genre: Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-05
Packaged: 2019-03-27 04:36:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13873278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soulofme/pseuds/soulofme
Summary: “Maybe it was fate,” she whispers. She laughs then, soft and bitter, and the sound worms its way into his ears and settles there, echoing for far too long. “Do you believe in it?”“No,” he says, tucking his hands into his pocket. He feels Madison’s gaze on the side of his face, then, so he closes his eyes and pretends he’s anywhere but here. “I don’t.”





	if i could, i would feel nothing

The call comes as a shock.

He and Madison had gone out for dinner, and were pressed together in one of the tiny booths at the back of a family-run diner they frequented. Madison was detailing her vacation to Quebec when her phone rang. She’d picked it up instantly, and her face grew more and more pale the longer she stayed on the phone. Finally, she hung up, looking him in the eye, and announced that Kevin was dead. She then rushed out of the restaurant, violently sobbing.

Now, nearly twenty minutes later, she leans against the wall and doesn’t look at him. She seems calm, a little flushed in the cheeks, but otherwise alright.

“We couldn’t have prevented it,” she says. She sounds sure of herself, as if she’d been rehearsing the words ever since they got the call. Maybe she has.

“Right,” he replies, because he feels he has to say _something_.

Madison sniffles, rubbing harshly at her tear-stained cheeks. She pops a piece of gum into her mouth and blows big bubbles, bubbles that pop almost as soon as they’re formed. Normally, the sound would have annoyed him. But he can hardly hear it over his own heartbeat, over the blood that rushes and pulses in his ears. Anxiety crawls up his spine, digs icy fingers into the nape of his neck. He can’t breathe, even as they stand outside surrounded by the crisp, evening air.

Kevin is dead, he thinks. It doesn’t seem any more true than it had twenty minutes ago.

“I mean, really,” Madison continues then, crossing her arms over her chest. “There’s nothing we could have done.”

“I know.”

Madison opens her mouth again, maybe to continue, maybe to change the subject, but suddenly changes her mind.

“Maybe it was fate,” she whispers. She laughs then, soft and bitter, and the sound worms its way into his ears and settles there, echoing for far too long. “Do you believe in it?”

“No,” he says, tucking his hands into his pocket. He feels Madison’s gaze on the side of his face, then, so he closes his eyes and pretends he’s anywhere but here. “I don’t.”

 

**—**

 

He sits by himself at his kitchen table, staring down at the picture of Kevin printed in this morning’s newspaper. It’s been a day since he heard the news, and yet it feels like no time has passed at all.

Kevin was popular in high school. People liked him because he made an effort to get to know everyone. He had a bright, bubbly personality and drew people towards him. He was impossible to forget.

He never quite understood it. He and Kevin hadn’t been friends then. They were too different. Kevin was uncharted territory that he didn’t have the strength of courage to explore.

 

**—**

 

They greet Gia at the airport. She has spent the last few years in Madrid, working with a fashion designer that he has never heard of. She takes her sunglasses off, big, dark frames that are ostentatiously large, and hooks them into the front of her shirt. There are dark bags under her eyes.

“You look well,” she says. She’s talking to Madison, but her eyes are on him.

He doesn’t bother with a response. He helps Gia with her bags while Madison goes to bring the car around. They stand on the curb, the wind whipping their hair astray. Gia laughs to herself, and he struggles to see what she finds so amusing.

“I never thought I’d come back to _this_ ,” she says. One of her hands reaches up to brush against her sunglasses.

“I don’t think any of us did,” he replies. Gia looks at him, strangely somber, and he feels his stomach begin to churn.

“Even you?” she asks.

Madison returns with the car. He’s never been happier to see her.

Gia doesn’t talk to him for the entirety of the car ride. To be fair, she doesn’t really talk to Madison either. She fills the car with an endless stream of useless words, all intended to break the tense silence that has fallen between them. She only stops when Madison pulls into the driveway, folding her hands demurely onto her lap. Her lower lip trembles violently, but she doesn’t shed a single tear.

“We’re here,” Madison says, a completely unnecessary announcement.

He goes to open the door, but then Gia grabs onto his arm. He imagines her neatly manicured nails piercing through his coat and grazing his skin, imagines them sinking down further and further until they reach bone.

“It’s not true, right?” Gia asks. Her eyes are wide as she frantically searches his face, maybe for comfort, maybe for sorrow. She looks away suddenly, and he figures she hasn’t found either.

He carefully peels her fingers off from his arm. She makes a sound then, something small and almost wounded, and he shelves it away in the back of his mind to analyze later. Gia is grieving now.

He’s not sure why it makes him feel so sick.

 

**—**

 

Kevin was never supposed to be born.

It sounded cruel to word it like that, but those were the exact words Kevin used. His mother was hit by a car when she was pregnant with him, but then a man had come along and promised to save her. Shortly afterwards, an ambulance arrived and she was whisked off to a hospital. Kevin was born a few hours later, perfectly healthy.

It sounded ridiculous, and he felt nothing but annoyance every time Kevin told that story. It didn’t help that Madison and Gia seemed enamored by it, always asking to hear it _just one more time_.

He didn’t try to imagine Kevin dying. It felt like dangerous territory, like such thoughts would be frowned upon if someone knew, and so he kept them to himself, never to be heard.

 

**—**

 

Gia stays by his side throughout the evening, even as people come up to greet her. She has a wide, plastic smile on her face. Every time the conversation shifts away from her, her face falls into something vacant, her eyes completely blank as they roam around the room.

The room is stuffy. People are ground together, chattering quietly. There’s a somber atmosphere around them, something tangible and real, but that doesn’t stop a few giggles from smattering the air. He assumes they’re sharing stories about Kevin, stories that will lighten the mood, and doesn’t give them any more attention.

He spots Kevin’s father among the crowd. Neither of them say anything, but that doesn’t stop Gia from worming through everyone to get to him. He follows after her simply because he doesn’t trust Gia by herself.

“Mr. Dane,” Gia says, her voice soft and subdued. It’s barely audible over the rest of the conversations around them. “I’m sorry.”

“I haven’t seen you in years,” Mr. Dane says, gazing appreciatively at her. It makes sense. Gia is pretty by most standards, with a round, youthful face and expressive, dark eyes. Everyone called her Snow White growing up because she had the grace of a princess. “You look great.”

“I’m sorry we couldn’t meet under better circumstances,” Gia continues, reaching forward to grab onto Mr. Dane’s arm. “This is such a huge shock.”

“I’m sorry too,” Mr. Dane replies. He looks away from her then, his gaze refocusing on him. “I know you two had your differences, but Kevin always spoke so highly of you.”

 _I wish I could do the same_ , he wants to say. He doesn’t. He can’t, really, not with Gia and Mr. Dane both looking at him, waiting for him to crumble.

“Yeah,” he settles for, a neutral answer that could be interpreted as the only thing he’s able to say without bursting into tears. “I’ve always admired him, too.”

 

**—**

 

Kevin had a brother.

His name was Scott, and he was two years younger than Kevin. They shared a father, but not a mother, and that was why they had never meet. Scott’s mother and their father were married, but Kevin’s mother was just a mistress. So, Scott’s mother wanted to keep him away from Kevin for as long as possible. Their father tried to care for both of his children, but ultimately Kevin fell through the cracks. When asked, Kevin would say that he was never jealous of Scott.

He never quite sounded like he meant it.

 

**—**

 

Madison gets sick halfway through the night, so he and Gia help her out to the car. They leave the door open and tell her to keep her head outside, hoping that the cool air will help. It doesn’t, not really, but Madison looks grateful for it anyway.

“I wish he wasn’t...you know,” she says. He snorts, shaking his head and looking away from her. It’s as if she fears the very word _dead_ will cause them all to burst into tears. Gia, maybe, but certainly not him.

“We all wish he wasn’t,” Gia murmurs, brushing Madison’s hair away from her face with careful fingers.

“Why didn’t I ever ask him?” she asks. It feels too raw, like Madison is baring her soul to them. It makes that sick feeling from before, that frustrating nausea he had in car,  reappear. “Why didn’t I ever ask if he was alright?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Gia insists, holding onto Madison’s shoulders. “We didn’t know.”

“She’s right,” he says anyway, not missing the way Madison’s head jerks upwards in shock. “It doesn’t matter. Really.”

Madison settles back against the seat, staring off at something in the distance. Something more beautiful, he guess, something he and Gia will never be able to see.

“He’s really dead,” she says, and tears begin to stream down her face.

 

**—**

 

Kevin’s mother suffered from depression.

She was a topic of contention, especially among his friends’ mothers. They criticized her consistently, claiming that she was an unfit parent. No one really knew that for certain, though, because Kevin always said that his mother was the best. He never complained about her, not even when he showed up to school with a big, dark bruise blossoming beneath his eye.

He said that he walked into a door, but no one believed him. No one dug any deeper into it either. Kevin’s mother was Kevin’s problem. No one else wanted to get involved.

 

**—**

 

He drives Gia to her hotel, Madison to her apartment, and himself to the high school. It’s not open, not at three in the morning on a Saturday, but that doesn’t really matter. He goes to the athletic building, breaks into the shed, and grabs a basketball.

Kevin used to be good at basketball. He quit in his junior year, claiming that the practices were too fatiguing. Everyone knew it was because he couldn’t afford new gear, or bus tickets, or basically anything at all. But no one cared enough to ask or to help.

He shakes his head, wondering why he cares. When Kevin quit the team, he was glad. Kevin being gone meant that _he_ finally had a chance to get off the bench. It didn’t work out that way, though. Coach kept him on the bench and didn’t even bat an eye when he quit six weeks later.

He dribbles the ball against the court, listening as the sound of it hitting the pavement echoes around him. The wind whistles against his ear, reminding him of all those years he spent trapped in Kevin’s shadow, and the bitterness inside of him rises and swells like a tidal wave.

 

**—**

 

Kevin liked to write.

He said he wasn’t trying to do anything with it, that it was just something to occupy his time with, and that he thought it helped. Help with what, he never said, but he mentioned this his mother used to write. She wanted to be a journalist when she was a child, but she was never able to attend college. She settled for scribbling on a notebook whenever she could. Kevin said she had thirty of them, stacked up beside her bed, and he would read them while she slept. He said they were wonderful, that his mother had such a passion for life.

Last year, he’d said he wished he never read them. No one got the chance to ask him why.

 

**—**

 

“I’m staying for a little while longer,” Gia announces, stirring her cup of coffee. Her hotel room has a balcony. He doesn’t know why she’s sitting on it in the middle of winter, snow up to her ankles.

“You’re going to get sick.”

“Didn’t you hear me?” Gia murmurs. “I’m staying.”

“I know. I heard you.”

“Good,” she whispers. She cradles the cup in her hands. “I think I loved him.”

It’s a familiar statement. In high school, Gia had the biggest crush on Kevin. They had all assumed that she got over it as time passed, but no one was certain that she had.

“You didn't,” he says. He settles comfortably against the doorframe, watching as Gia kicks snow around with her feet. She must be freezing, he thinks. She’s wearing nothing more than a bathrobe and socks. But he doesn’t offer her his coat, or implore that she come inside. She’s not his problem.

“How do you know that?”

“Well, how do _you_ know that you did?” he retorts. Gia looks wounded by it, but he’s too irritated to care.

“I felt it,” she says. Her voice sounds horrifically vulnerable, and he closes his eyes as if he can shield himself from it.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Maybe not. But I know you’re glad he’s gone.”

He looks at her sharply, and Gia returns his shocked gaze with a smug look of her own.

“I’m not,” he insists. He’s not quite sure who he’s trying to convince.

“Okay,” Gia says. She doesn’t say anything else, not even when he walks away and lets the door slam shut behind him.

 

**—**

 

Kevin was murdered by his mother.

She killed him first, and wrapped him in a sheet so she wouldn’t have to look at him. Then she hung herself, and her son’s blood trickled down her fingertips and dripped onto the floor. They stayed like that for about a week until the neighbor’s started complaining about the smell.

When the police ran their investigation, they found her journals. Thirty stacked up beside the bed, and one wedged beneath the mattress. The first thirty were what one would expect from a journal. Thoughts about the day, memories of past events, pages full of rambling. They were quickly discarded.

The last one, the hidden one, was different. Kevin’s mother talked about regret, about loneliness and pain. She talked about her son, and how he had trapped her in such an unfortunate life. She talked about killing him, and herself, to ease her own suffering.

Kevin’s death was fate, decided by his own mother.

 

**—**

 

Scott’s father calls him a week after the funeral.

They sit in his office, surrounded by glass, and there’s something oddly vulnerable about it. His assistant gives them both steaming cups of coffee before she disappears to her cubicle. The man drums his fingers against his desk and clears his throat softly.

“How are you holding up?”

“I’m fine,” he says. It’s not a lie, but it’s not quite the truth either. “You?”

“Well enough,” Scott’s father answers. He sips his coffee and nods to himself. “Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“Do you blame me?”

“Should I?” he asks. He doesn’t flinch when the man flattens his hand and brings it down hard, the _bang_ ringing in his ears.

“Don’t do this to me.”

“You did this to yourself,” he says. He doesn’t look back at the man before him, even as he hears him begin to sob. “You had a choice. You did whatever you wanted to.”

“You’re my son,” the man says then, his voice feeble.

“So was Kevin,” he replies.

Scott stands up, trembling all over, and closes his eyes. It doesn’t block out the sobs, or the pain, or the picture of Kevin in his obituary, smiling.

“Scott,” his father says, hysterical, and his eyes snap open. “Scott.”

Scott looks at him, really looks at his _father_ , sees an empty shell staring back at him. His father may not have killed Kevin, but his blood is still on his hands.

He doesn’t say anything as he leaves the office. He goes down to the lobby and escapes outside, sitting heavily on the curb. The trembling has stopped, but there’s something tight around his neck, something heavy that feels like it’s crushing his windpipe.

Scott closes his eyes and relishes the pain.


End file.
